We want to helpSwedish industry
get its products
onto the market
even faster

TEXT JESPER HULTÉN

13.11.2015

We want to help Swedish industry get its products onto the market even faster

Sweden is traditionally a nation of inventors. Autodesk’s integrated CAD/CAM tool allows you to both streamline the design process and gain better control of the production, explains Rikard Levenstam, Technical Sales Manager at Future Group, which distributes Autodesk’s software.

Rikard is responsible for all technology in relation to dealers. This responsibility includes the so-called post processors that adapt information from the CAM software to the digitally-controlled CNC machines. A post processor, for example, converts milling paths for a workpiece that need to be processed into executable files for a CNC milling cutter. In addition to converting tool paths into control commands for CNC machines, Rikard’s work also involves optimising other processes that contribute to making the CNC processing as effective as possible.

Inventor HSM is an easy-to-use and powerful tool for generating and optimising tool programs for CNC machines.

Autodesk® Inventor HSM™ 2016 CAD/CAM helps the CNC programmer, designer and engineer to quickly produce machine processed workpieces, regardless of the CAD system in which they were designed. In addition to all standard strategies, Inventor HSM includes advance functions in the area of calculated tool paths for milling and turning such as adaptive machining, tools for integrated simulation and verification as well as a powerful post processor that both increases productivity and reduces lead times from idea to finished product.

– Inventor HSM is an easy-to-use and powerful tool for generating and optimising tool programs for CNC machines. The advantage of a fully integrated CAM solution is that the CAM preparation becomes both simpler and takes less time to carry out. With Inventor HSM it can take anything from 10 minutes to half a day, if the details have a complicated geometry, to generate optimal tool paths. And when you update the CAD software, you avoid having to redo CAM preparations as the existing CNC commands are automatically updated.

Cloud-based strategies

Autodesk’s CAM tool

Autodesk’s CAM tool HSM is integrated in Autodesk® Inventor HSM™, HSMWorks for SolidWorks and Autodesk® Fusion 360™. HSM™ handles everything from 2.5 axial processing of details to geometries that require 3+2 axes or 5 axes simultaneously. This means that the tool, in addition to moving in three dimensions, can be rotated in two directions for access to the whole workpiece.

The most significant benefits
of an integrated CAM tool:

Seamless and natural workflow from CAD drawing to CAM preparation and on to executable CNC files.

Integrated simulation and verification.

Easy to calculate new tool paths.

When the CAD software is updated, you avoid having to redo the CAM preparation as the CNC files are automatically updated.

The HSM software, in other words, the calculation engine, can distribute the calculation information in a local network for a more efficient use of existing processor capacity. The step to working fully in the cloud is therefore not a big one. The strategy has already been implemented in Autodesk® Fusion 360™ which also supports 3D printing. The option for producing a 3D printed prototype means that designers can quickly get a feeling of whether they were thinking along the right lines when designing the workpiece.

– Fusion 360 also gives members of a project the option for working online, or in other words, sharing ideas, comments and editing design proposals in a way similar to the interaction on other social platforms.

One company that has taken the cloud-based strategies seriously is Mannerfelt Design Team, which designs everything from competition boats for Offshore Racing to family boats and luxury yachts. Since the client, model engineer and manufacturer are in different locations around the world, the cloud has become the natural meeting place. It is easy to arrange video conferences between the relevant parties in which they can all turn and rotate the 3D models that have been created. This means that it is possible to produce boats that are twice as large in only three months, which is half the time previously required. The step from idea to first sketch in Showcase only takes 10 days.

– It’s great that Autodesk, which is so big within CAD design, is also investing in CAM. This means that manufacturing companies can achieve an efficient flow through the different process steps from idea and design to finished product. And, in line with the integration of the CAM software in the CAD tool, the flow from design to simulation and verification is both seamless and natural. In addition, it is much easier to recalculate the milling paths for a workpiece if any problems should occur. In addition to an improvement in the quality and a reduction of the time it takes to introduce new products to the market, this creates great opportunities for companies that are considering bringing production that is currently being outsourced to low-wage countries back home.

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